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Arab League Renews Call for UK to Recognize Palestine

Palestinians throw shoes at an effigy depicting Arthur Balfour during a protest in the West Bank city of Bethlehem (Reuters)
Palestinians throw shoes at an effigy depicting Arthur Balfour during a protest in the West Bank city of Bethlehem (Reuters)
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Arab League Renews Call for UK to Recognize Palestine

Palestinians throw shoes at an effigy depicting Arthur Balfour during a protest in the West Bank city of Bethlehem (Reuters)
Palestinians throw shoes at an effigy depicting Arthur Balfour during a protest in the West Bank city of Bethlehem (Reuters)

The Arab League (AL) has renewed its call for the UK to recognize the independent Palestinian State. The pan-Arab organization also called on the UK to correct the 'historical British mistake', when then UK Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour promised to establish a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine.

The organization also demanded the UK correct the mistake by supporting peace through backing the two-state solution and pushing Israel to stop its crimes and violations against the Palestinian people.

In a statement on Monday, marking the 103rd anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, the AL said that the British declaration was the start point of the tragedy of the century and caused historical injustice for the Palestinian people.

The organization said the Palestinian people have been suffering the repercussions of the declaration for more than a century, undergoing displacement, ethnic cleansing, and other continuing crimes carried out by the Israelis, according to the statement.

"There is only one path for comprehensive and permanent peace, which is ending the Israeli occupation and establishing the Palestinian State with Eastern Jerusalem as a capital, in accordance with the international legitimacy resolutions and the Arab Peace Initiative," it added.

It also stressed its full support to the Palestinian people in their fair struggle, slamming the Israeli violations and practices and the establishment of settlements.

On 2 November 1917, Balfour promised the Anglo-Jewish community that the British Empire, which was occupying Palestine at that time, would support the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine.

In a related development, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh called on Britain to recognize the independent state of Palestine on the borders approved by the international legitimacy with East Jerusalem as its capital.

Speaking during a weekly online meeting of the Palestinian Authority cabinet, Shtayyeh said that "the recognition of a Palestinian state must be the British compensation."

For his part, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement said in a press statement that the Palestinian people "will not yield to the plans that began with the Balfour Declaration."

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New Year Hope and Joy Reign in a Damascus Freed from Assad

A young woman holds the Flag of Syria as people celebrate the New Year near Umayyad Square in Damascus, Syria, on January 1, 2025. (AFP)
A young woman holds the Flag of Syria as people celebrate the New Year near Umayyad Square in Damascus, Syria, on January 1, 2025. (AFP)
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New Year Hope and Joy Reign in a Damascus Freed from Assad

A young woman holds the Flag of Syria as people celebrate the New Year near Umayyad Square in Damascus, Syria, on January 1, 2025. (AFP)
A young woman holds the Flag of Syria as people celebrate the New Year near Umayyad Square in Damascus, Syria, on January 1, 2025. (AFP)

Umayyad Square in Damascus hummed to the throngs of people brandishing "revolution" flags as Syria saw in the new year with hope following 13 years of civil war.

Gunshots rang out from Mount Qasioun overlooking the capital where hundreds of people gazed up at fireworks, an AFP reporter at the square saw.

It was the first new year's celebration without an Assad in power for more than 50 years after the fall of Bashar al-Assad in December.

"Long live Syria, Assad has fallen," shouted some children.

"We did not expect such a miracle to happen, today the Syrians have found their smile again," Layane el Hijazi, a 22-year-old agricultural engineering student, told AFP from Umayyad Square.

"We were able to obtain our rights, we can now talk. I am letting off steam these last three weeks and tonight by bringing out everything I had buried," she said.

Despite the revelry, soldiers patrolled the streets of Damascus less than a month after Assad's rapid demise.

The green, white and black revolution flag with its three red stars flies all over the capital.

Such a sight -- the symbol of the Syrian people's uprising against the Assad dynasty's iron-fisted rule -- was unthinkable a month ago.

The fall of Assad brought an end to more than half a century of unchallenged rule by his family's clan over Syria, where dissent was repressed and public freedoms were heavily curtailed.

"Whatever happens, it will be better than before," said Imane Zeidane, 46, a cartoonist, who came to Umayyad Square with her husband and their daughter.

"I am starting the new year with serenity and optimism," she said, adding that she has "confidence" in the new government under de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa.

She also remembers that new year's celebrations in previous years were "not like this".

"The joy is double now -- you come down to celebrate the new year with your heart, and celebrate the hope it carries," Zeidane said.

- 'Fears have dissipated' -

The revolutionary song "Lift your head, you are a free Syrian" by Syrian singer Assala Nasri rang out loud on Umayyad Square.

"Every year, we aged suddenly by 10 years," taxi driver Qassem al-Qassem, 34, told AFP in reference to the tough living conditions in a country whose economy collapsed under Assad.

"But with the fall of regime, all our fears have dissipated," he said.

"Now I have a lot of hope. But all we want now is peace."

More than half a million people died in the 13-year civil war as the country split into different regions controlled by various warring parties.

Many families are still waiting for news of loved ones who went missing under Assad's rule, during which time tens of thousands of prisoners disappeared.

"I hope that Syria in 2025 will be non-denominational, pluralist, for everyone, without exception," said Havan Mohammad, a Kurdish student from the northeast studying pharmacy in the capital.